Today, I have some news to share with you: the Foundation for Middle East Peace now has a new website!

For decades, FMEP has been at the forefront of Israel and Palestine advocacy. With the launch of our new website, the organization’s online presence now takes on a 2015 look and approach to technology and social media integration.

We have been working on this project for months and couldn’t be more excited about the end result. The new site is designed to optimize user experience, curate the latest news and resources and provide easily-accessible information about the key issues of the conflict and ideas for a peaceful resolution. (more…)

In this case, I felt APN’s statement captured a realistic, nuanced and reasoned view so well, I thought it appropriate to reprint it here in full. The original can be found here.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

June 23, 2014

APN Statement on PC (USA) Divestment Decision

Washington, DC – Following the decision by the Presbyterian Church (USA) to divest from three U.S. companies whose products, they argue, are used to support Israeli occupation, Americans for Peace Now today issued the following statement: (more…)

I weigh in on the controversy over Barack Obama’s possible nomination of Chuck Hagel to the post of Secretary of Defense in a guest post at Muzzlewatch, Jewish Voice for

Senator Chuck Hagel

Peace’s blog. On the issue of Israel and the Middle East, rarely has there been a more important moment for US policy. This is a moment where the Israel Lobby could well suffer a significant defeat, and that matters.

Rabbi Brant Rosen, Co-Chair of the Rabbinical Council of Jewish Voice for Peace

I think I’ve shifted from a liberal Zionist approach—viewing the conflict as two peoples who have two legitimate claims to the land and the only way out of the morass is two states for two people. I believed in the importance of a Jewish state and identified with Israel as a Jew; that was my narrative growing up. I have deep familial relationships in Israel, visited there many times, considered moving there…it was a gradual thing, but the breaking point was Operation Cast Lead in 2008 (Cast Lead was the code name given to Israel’s 2008-09 assault on Gaza). I came to realize this was not a conflict between two equal parties but an essential injustice that began with the birth of the state of Israel and continued since that time. It is a case of one very powerful party bending the other to its will.

Once I spoke out about Israel’s outrages in Cast Lead, the dominoes really started to fall for me. At first I didn’t know where that brought me, and wasn’t sure where I stood. As a congregational rabbi I was in a difficult place and people looked to me for guidance. About a year after that, I really reassessed my relationship as a Jew to Israel, to the entire issue, not just Gaza, about Zionism in general. In the blog pieces I wrote for the book I wrote very extensively about my thoughts and my activity during this time. Brian Walt and I started Jewish Fast for Gaza, and we found a number of rabbis who stood with us to launch the initiative to end the blockade of the Strip and search for a just peace. I become more involved in Palestine Solidarity work, reaching out to Palestinians, some of whom were friends and others who were activists in this area, moving beyond my fear of them as “other.” So many of them reached out to me when I spoke out on Gaza, and I wanted to learn from them what their experience of this issue was. (more…)

At Alternet, I argue that Israel’s own behavior is finally breaking down the walls for liberals all over the world, even in the US. The long-held epithet “PEP” (Progressive Except for Palestine) tried to shine a light on the difficult tension between liberal values and support for Israel’s excuses as to why it expands settlements and tightens its occupation. But now, Israel has stretched that to such a point that it is becoming impossible for liberals to ignore the reality of Israeli human rights abuses, rejectionism and land grabs. This wave overtook Europe some time ago, but now even US liberals, even Jewish ones, are moving away from their support for Israeli actions. AIPAC’s influence will become even more expensive as a result.

This week’s piece in Souciant reminds my readers that I don’t write the headlines there. The piece actually follows up my article last week on Greta Berlin, the Christian letter regarding aid to Israel and anti-Semitism. This time, though, I single out J Street, unfortunately, for its sad behavior regarding the US role in resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

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